Dread Isle Ambush
by SpeakerOfTheStars
Summary: An account of the disaster that befell the 5th Wing of Pegasus Knights, told through the eyes of its commander, Fiora. First chapter. Second chapter due very soon. Mild violence in later chapters. Please read & review!
1. Chapter 1: Moist

((Right, so, this is my second submission but my first real full length story. I've always loved Fire Emblem and have wanted to do something like this for years, but only recently got around to it on a lazy Sunday afternoon. It's not my best work; I haven't reveiwed it much at all, so it won't be perfect. Forgive me. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this as much as I did writing it.

Read, review, rest, relax, whatever. Please!

Disclaimer: I do not own, nor have I created, Fire Emblem or any of its respective content.

Enjoy!))

Chapter 1: Moist

Warm rain battered Fiora's face as she struggled to lift her head out of the relative shelter she found behind the raised neck of her pegasus. Her hair, which had turned a dark blue from continued exposure to the wet, was matted down all over her face and continued, soggy, under her collar, bringing with it a permeating, clammy feeling to the rest of her body. Ever since the 5th wing of Illian Pegasus Knights came within half a day's flight to the Dread Isle, the weather had either been that of a constant monsoon or a thick, tangible fog. Fiora's knights had been prepared for both: they wore heavy, full-length coats over their uniforms and insulated leggings under their traditional short skirts in order to keep the sogginess at bay; for the fog, each of the 5th's twenty-three knights carried a torch and a standard-issue signal book in her knapsack.

Fiora cursed her stupidity: they were heading south, and her knights had been equipped with Illian winter overcoats that were meant to keep the biting winter cold from doing its terrible, frostbitten work. The coats' fur lining, when wet, began to smell and, when the rain stopped, the coats were far too warm for the pseudo tropical weather of the Southern sea. Whenever she caught a glimpse of her knights, Fiora could see their faces were red from the effects of the wet heat.

The torches, too, were problematic: they worked well for the first fog the knights had ran into: the use of universal signals kept the women calm and together. After the first rain doused the flames and waterlogged the torches, however, no one could get theirs to catch. Eventually, the knights had to resort to using their own voices to communicate and, where that failed, they had to fly extremely close together in a formation considered 'dangerous' both to military strategists and animal caretakers: the pegasi occasionally kicked and snapped at each other, and an enemy with any sense could very easily wreak havoc among the tightly packed cohort.

Fiora was furious and even a bit fearful, but she could do nothing to rectify the situation and, more importantly, nor could she land and regroup. All she could do was clutch her jacket close to her chest as the rain assaulted her every sense and continue to shout commands through the intermittent foggy soup. Worst of all, though, she feared that she may soon overshoot her objective: she had assumed that she would able to see the Dread Isle when the 5th flew over its forests, but as time passed, she became more and more uncertain. What if it is too foggy to land? What if they were flying too close to the surface and the Isle had a high cliff face? What if, Elimine forbid, they had already passed the Isle? Her pegasi were already near exhaustion and couldn't fly forever, nor could they swim.

Lord Pent had not given her many specifics: she and her wing were to travel to the Dread Isle, gather whatever intelligence they could on _something_ (Pent wouldn't say), and return with a map or at least some detailed information on the Isle's topography. Fiora had accepted before she researched the assignment partially out of a 'How hard could it be?' mindset and partially out of a form of greed: the Marquess Reglay had paid up front and very handsomely, and the Island's proximity to Lycia's ever-curious, competing, and rich Lords was surely to play into her purse's hands.

She took another swig from her canteen and sighed as the still-warm tea from this morning's campfire soothe her throat, which was already tender from overuse. The rain was letting up and fog was visible on a pitiful excuse for a horizon: Fiora harrumphed and gave the order to close ranks. The knights, who had previously been flying in a spaced-out 'V' formation, spurred their beasts into a tight clump so as each knight would always be in at least one other's sights. Fiora wasn't going to lose a single comrade on this mission, especially not to what was essentially a low hung cloud.

Sure enough, minutes after the knights assumed their formation, the rain stopped and the fog almost immediately filled its place. Fiora kept her tight grip on the reins absolutely steady in order to prevent her pegasus from nudging or bumping its companions. As the 5th continued onward, Fiora was tempted to let her mind drift off to thoughts of home: of Illia, her sisters, snow, her bed, warm fireside meals…

She shook herself back into the present. Home was months away: the most she could ask for now was what most of the world feared: the Dread Isle.

"Commander!"

Fiora's head snapped up, though she had little clue as to which direction the voice had come from. "Go ahead," she shouted into the sky.

More to come soon!


	2. Chapter 2: Land

Chapter 2: Land

"It's land, ma'am! Right below-" the voice paused. "Right behind us!"

Fiora looked down, then spun around in her saddle. Sure enough, a tiny spit of land hid in the shadows a short distance behind her knights. From what she could see, it was either a thin peninsula or a tiny island: either way, she berated herself for missing it. If it indeed was, as she suspected, a small island, had there been others? Did she miss those too?

That would have to wait. Fiora yelled orders directing the 5th to this chunk of land: she had to act fast before the island vanished from view. No excited chatter came from the knights: they were all, Fiora included, exhausted, sweaty, and overheated. The pegasi weren't keen on speeding toward dry land or anything, for that matter, so the cohort approached their newfound safe haven at an almost torturously slow pace. Fiora directed the knights toward the first potential campsite she saw: a clearing on the border between the woods and the beach. As far as she could tell, it was only moderately defensible and part of it was potentially in the island's tidal zone, but she didn't have the will to find the island's high ground. She took comfort in the fog, however: if she almost missed the island, any potential attacker may as well.

Once they all had landed (and Fiora made sure _all_ the knights had landed: they lined up for a count twice) and dismounted, Fiora gave the order to tie up the pegasi and pitch tents. As her second in command, Monica, repeated the orders and began to take charge, Fiora dismounted, handed her reins to a junior knight, and, much to her legs' dismay, headed off into the thick forest in an effort to gain some sort of bearings. She left her lance behind, confident enough in her skill with a much easier to carry sword.

Fiora spent the better part of a half hour determining their location. She discovered, to her relief, that the 5th had indeed landed on a small peripheral island and not the Dread Isle itself: they would be safe for the night. The island was about a half mile in length and was completely flat, so there was no advantage in moving inland. She saw no evidence of game, so the knights would have to dine on cold (and now moist) rations again.

Fiora returned to an established, if hastily so, camp, complete with a slow burning fire and a command tent for herself and her lieutenants. Her knights had soggy and gray looks on their faces; a few were off gathering dry tinder, but the majority were left in camp. Most stood as she walked past, but some had already drifted off to sleep.

"Commander." The 5th's second lieutenant, Dominique, struggled to her feet and approached Fiora. She looked as miserable as the rest; her normally straight brown hair was still soggy and gave her the appearance of having just gotten out of bed. Her lightly tanned face contrasted her blueish lips: "We're in a bad state, ma'am. We lost four days rations on our flight here: two knights lost their packs in a fogbound collision and two more didn't seal everything up properly and spoiled their supplies. I did the math, and-"

"I know. We can't stay here long." Fiora sighed. This was nothing she hadn't expected, but she couldn't have overburdened the pegasi. They had to travel light to get this far in such a short time. "Who's short?"

"Two first years ran into each other early in the day. They managed to keep their weapons and coats, but everything else tumbled off their mounts. One girl twisted her ankle; she isn't too keen on walking."

_Oh, not injuries…_ "And the others?"

"Jamie and myself, ma'am."

"You? I suspected Jamie, but I thought higher of you." Jamie was a bit overweight and was known to sneak into her rations during such a long flight: she probably forgot to close her knapsack back up.

Dominique muttered a low 'Sorry' and turned her gaze to her feet.

Fiora was loathe to be mean, especially now and especially to Dominique, who was certainly the 5th's best swordswoman and possibly one of the best-humored knights Fiora had ever had the pleasure to command, but she was too soggy, too tired, and too stressed to be forgiving. "You've got first shift, then. Tell Jaime she has the one after you." Such a punishment was commonplace for a regular, but it was especially poignant for the second lieutenant. Dominique should have known better, though.

Supper, a miserable, watery stew boiled over a bed of leaves and twigs in the simplest of metal pots, was ready, and Fiora waved Dominique to go and get her fill. Even though she had wasted a day's worth of food, Fiora couldn't have her officers going hungry on the eve before the main part of their operation. Fiora followed the rest of her knights as they shuffled over to the campfire, but declined her own meal. Her empty stomach protested loudly, but she had no appetite for such a pitiful excuse for soup. As the fog lifted and rain returned, Fiora watched her knights eat as she herself drank mugs' worth of water in an effort to fill her stomach with something. Before long, the order to go to sleep was given, and Fiora waited for the rest of the women (Dominique excepted) to return to their tents before she herself retired. Her cot was damp and soggy, but she felt she could have slept anywhere at this point. She went to sleep in uniform; it wasn't like she had any dry clothes to change into.

Fiora awoke abruptly only a few hours later. She remembered, almost ashamedly, that she hadn't relieved herself since the morning; the water that she drank earlier wasn't helping, either. She rolled out of bed and looked outside her tent: it was still raining and now completely dark outside. She was loathe to leave her now dry tent, but her full-to-bursting bladder persuaded her otherwise. She was halfway out of her tent when she turned around and, as an afterthought, danced and squirmed through the process of strapping her sword on her waist. She made a note to kick herself for this later: she was a mercenary commander, not a schoolgirl.

Fiora walked briskly, almost at a jog, to the edge of the clearing. She steered herself wide of Jamie; the girl would probably be dying for someone to talk to at this point. For the sake of modesty, Fiora went a few minutes into the forest before she began to negotiate her leggings and hike up her skirt.

She had just begun to squat down when she heard the first scream. Her whole body tensed: she recognized the voice. A first year, from a little village-

Another scream, then yelling, and, most worryingly, the unmistakable sound of metal on metal. _We're under attack!_

Fiora fixed herself up as quickly as possible before running as best she could through the forest toward camp. As she got closer, the sounds of battle grew to a crescendo and an orange glow began to appear on the horizon. Fiora was suddenly glad she didn't wear her coat: she was going to fight tonight. As soon as she reached the clearing, Fiora drew her sword and surveyed the field.

To her dismay, she noticed all of her pegasi were still grounded: her knights were fighting on foot. The enemy had no pegasi of its own, nor wyverns or any visible way of reaching the island. She reasoned that they must have come ashore via small skiffs or something of the like.

Enemy archers stood on the beach, firing a steady stream of flaming arrows at the tents while soldiers ransacked the camp itself. Fiora's heart was pounding: where were her knights? She saw one girl get cut down by two enormous men with axes, but couldn't spot any sort of main body of resistance. Then, to the right: Dominique and Monica formed part of a line in front of a tattered supply tent. Fiora started to run toward them, but changed her mind and ran around toward the opposite side of camp. She could do more damage to the attackers by going after the defenseless archers and by gathering survivors.

Fiora crouched behind a burning tent, gripping her sword in an adrenaline-induced fervor. As she moved from cover to cover, she always kept the main body of attackers in her field of vision. She swelled with pride as she saw her remaining knights giving the enemy a fight they hadn't expected at this hour in the morning. _If we get out of this alive, I'll have to commend Jaime for raising the alarm._

Fiora had made her way to the camp's centre, but from there on out she had no more cover to rely on. The tents that formerly stood here had burned, and she had a good 15 meters between her and the enemy's archers. Just before Fiora made the dash across no man's land, she felt something slam into her back and landed face first in the mud. She whirled around and, still on the ground, groped for her sword while simultaneously wiping the dirt from her eyes. Fiora stood up as quickly as possible and, expecting an enemy, settled into a defensive stance.

((I'm becoming less and less happy with this as I write. At this point, I'm not sure I'll finish; I'm writing myself into a bit of a hole. Nevertheless, enjoy!))


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